financial independence

This photo does not do justice to SuperK’s seafood gumbo. It tastes even better the next day. I’ve always been a huge fan of leftovers. In our family, groceries are our second-largest expense, so as The Frug, I am always going out of my way to make sure nothing goes to waste unless it’s absolutely necessary (mold growing on it, stinks, slimy to touch etc.).

The average family of four in the US spends about $1025 a month on groceries. In urban areas, like the DC Metro area, this number is closer to $1250. My wife SuperK tells me our grocery bill is even higher due to the fact that we eat lots of Meat, Seafood and other high protein delicacies.

So, it’s a bit of a conundrum to be a Frug and still really enjoy giant lumps of crabmeat floating in your gumbo! One way we like to deal with this is maximizing the leftovers. Years ago, I came across the website http://www.feedthepig.org/. It has links to some simple calculators and ideas to put your savings in high gear by skipping all kinds of things, including expensive lattes, $13 lunches and premium cable plans. Feed the Pig also lists all types of expense slashing ideas (by habit) to help you reach your savings goals.

Replacing some lunches out with leftovers is a great way to do this. One big advantage of working from home, or an office with a nice fridge, is the ability to really tap into the leftovers and skip a few lunches out a week. You’ll also find that, if you do it right, most of the leftovers will be a lot healthier than what you might find at that gourmet burger joint or KFC.

Here’s a quick look at some results from the lunch calculator. Notice I still eat out once or twice a week. The key message here, is that you start to apply these frugal tools to other expenses in life, like a latte-a-day habit or shoe addictions, you can really start to see results. As you get closer to financial independence, you’ll find that you’ve applied this type of thinking to many parts of your daily life and have started putting those dollars to work for you. Keep in mind every dollar that you save and invest will continue to work for you and produce returns year after year long after you’ve stopped working for a paycheck.

I was given the nickname “The Frug” by my beautiful wife Kelly. She has a blog, kellysuperficial.com from here on out “SuperK” as that’s how lazy of a typist I am. She writes about celebrities, makeup, and fashion. Sometimes she uses her blog to complain about me and my frugal ways! (when I am merely trying to dissuade her from spending our kids’ college education funds at Target, Nordstrom,and Sephora!)

I think she’s got at least 100 blog posts that mention “The Frug.” Anyway, I thought, “why do I deserve this nickname?” By all appearances, we are certainly not that frugal. In fact, I believe we spend more than most families on what I call “family T&E” or as SuperK calls it “Family Fun Time.” (I think she is being sarcastic, but what do I know?) It’s our biggest budget item. This blog is mostly about our journey from spending on “stuff” to spending on adventures.

Regardless, the name stuck so I decided to really start living it. A few years ago, I registered the domain name “thefrug.com” but never got around to starting the blog as I was too busy dealing with, you guessed it, “stuff.” I think when most people hear the word frugal they think of a penny-pinching coupon clipping recluse. I’d like to redefine the term.

Let’s start with the Wikipedia definition of frugality:

Frugality is the quality of being frugal, sparing, thrifty, prudent or economical in the use of consumable resources such as food, time or money, and avoiding waste, lavishness or extravagance.

I like to think of it this way Frugality = Less and Less = More. So this blog is really about enjoying life more by consuming less. Especially less stuff.

The formula is pretty simple, by consuming less we free up time and money to spend on life’s experiences, instead of stuff. And if we can develop lean spending habits for travel, for work, and for life in general, everyone benefits. I’ve been working on this for years and I want to encourage people to join me in the War on Stuff . I also want to share everything I’ve learned in my long journey towards a lean lifestyle.

So, what am I going to be talking about? Mostly, this blog will be about improving your personal economy and enjoyment of life through living lean, working lean and traveling lean. Many personal finance blogs spend a lot of time focused on the economy, the stock market and the general insanity of the day-to-day world of finance. That’s not for us. We know we have no control over that and most of the advice is contradictory or flat out wrong.

My goal is to guide you towards financial independence so you can be free from worrying about the news, the market and your 401K balance.